By Matthew Russell Lee, Patreon
BBC - Guardian UK - Honduras - ESPN
UN GATE, Feb 11 – The moves by Antonio Guterres to try to get five more years in the UN Mansion on Sutton Place by further selling out human rights, banning the Press which asks questions about genocide in Cameroon, peacekeepers' rapes and Chinese bribes at the UN continue.
But in his lust for an unmerited second term as UNSG, Guterres on February 5 got fellow censor UK PR Barbara Woodward and Turkish strongman PGA Volkan Bozkir to issue a letter kicking off what he hopes to be a rigged process. Woodward even gushed about openness, while her UK Mission refuses to answer written questions from Inner City Press, including about Guterres' shameful cover up of sexual abuse by his crony Fabrizio Hochschild.
On February 8, a first of what should be many challengers, leading over the hill corrupto Guterres to withdraw. First out the box: Arora Akanksha. She's worked at the UNFPA, so she should know just how low Guterres has taken the UN system.
Inner City Press first reported her campaign on February 8, and on the morning of February 9 asked not only Guterres and his spokespeople about it, but also PGA Zolkan Bozkir and his spokesman Brendan Varma, and UNSC President Barbara Woodward, who promised "openness." Nothing, no answer - collusion.
And now, to the candidate, threats: A message to "take this down before you get fired... It's against all UN rules to do this kind of thing." As Inner City Press opined, if the last is any guide, the threat could come from Guterres himself or, since he uses ghost writers, a crony like Fabrizio Hochschild.
Here were and are Inner City Press' February 9 questions to Woodward (same to Bozkir): "What are PR Woodward's / the UK's comments on and actions if any on the now announced candidacy for UNSG of Arora Akanksha, who says "not enough has been done other than reshuffling of the bureaucracy and recycling ineffective leaders with new titles and nameplates. What ails the UN is a failure of leadership"? And how can Inner City Press continuing ban from the UN and your briefings be justified as anything but censorship, given for example that the IMF took and answered Inner City Press / my question on Myanmar / Burma on Feb 4, 2021?" Nothing.
Likewise, those state media and retirees let into Spokesman Stephane Dujarric's February 9 and 10 briefings by Melissa Fleming tellingly did not ask about Arora or any other candidate. Corrupt.
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